Viola
Dewdrop refraction
Dewdrop refraction
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Jul, 2016Views
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Behind The Lens
Location
I took this photograph in my garden, shortly after a quick Summer rain shower. I quickly found the perfect blade of grass with a good balance of rain drops and set up my camera and a background flower. The flower in this case is one of my favourites... a Viola. I love their delicate petals and soft pastel colours.Time
It was around 7pm, the Golden Hour. The air was still which is essential in macro photography. The slightest breeze can look like a hurricane at the end of a macro lens and can blur the droplets, or worse, they can fall off completely, ruining the entire composition.Lighting
The lighting is gorgeous at this time of day, without the harsh daytime Summer Sun. I also used an off camera flash to light the back of the flower.Equipment
This was shot using a Canon 1100D camera with a Tamron 90mm macro lens. I also used a Canon 430EX II Speedlite.Inspiration
I took up photography as a hobby 3 years. I tried several different genre, including animals and landscapes. I bought a photography magazine which included a small section on macro. I was amazed at the details in the photographs and one image caught my eye instantly. It was a flower droplet refraction. I could not believe that an entire flower was captured within a tiny water droplet and I was convinced it was not real. After some research into macro photography, I purchased a 2nd hand lens. However, I soon realised that it was not as simple as I had first thought. It was incredibly frustrating and tested my patience, but those delicate little droplets are so addictive!Editing
I developed the RAW file in Lightroom and made small adjustments to the levels. I also noticed when zoomed in that there was a tiny black insect crawling on the background flower and cloned him out.In my camera bag
I don't have a great deal of equipment. Just my entry level DSLR, a kit lens, a 50mm prime lens and my macro lens (which rarely gets removed from my camera) and a speedlite.Feedback
I learned very quickly that macro photography can test your patience. It can be so frustrating, yet the results when all your hard work pays off is very rewarding. I rarely change my settings from 1/250s, f18 and iso200 as I find them suitable for most situations. My best advice for anyone is just keep at it. It will come. Find your patience, practise and learn to control your breathing as you will soon discover that your breath also has the same effect as that gentle breeze... Quite often I'll forget about breathing entirely!
